Beating England in Test would be our best achievement in cricket: Ireland skipper Andy Balbirnie

London [UK], June 1 (ANI): Ireland skipper Andy Balbirnie stated that defeating England at Lord’s Ground would be his team’s “best achievement in cricket,” emphasising that the game is a “pinnacle event.”

Ireland will face England in a four-day Test match at Lord’s from June 1.
The last time Ireland made their Lord’s appearance in the Test Whites against England was in July 2019. Since then, Balbirnie’s side has featured in three additional Tests – one against Bangladesh and two against Sri Lanka – earlier this year.

“If we were to beat England in the Test that would be easily our best achievement in cricket, in the game. It’s the hardest format against one of traditionally the best teams in the world at their home ground,” Skysports Andy Balbirnie as saying.

Ireland’s first Lord’s appearance four years ago was a remarkable event. Despite losing the Test by 143 runs, they were dominant with both the ball and the bat in the opening session. In their much-anticipated assignment, they will be attempting to recreate their first-inning exploits while also improving their second-inning performance.

“As a Test team, this is our pinnacle event, there’s no doubt about that, a Test match at Lord’s. I’m very fortunate that this is going to be my second Test at Lord’s and that’s an amazing thing for an Irish cricketer to say that they’ve achieved,” he added.

“We’ve played England in T20 cricket, we know how good they are in white ball and we found a way to beat them in those formats. I think we’ve got to just react on the spot,” Balbirnie said.

Ireland’s first Lord’s appearance four years ago was a remarkable event. Despite losing the Test by 143 runs, they were dominant with both the ball and the bat in the opening session. In their much-anticipated assignment, they will be attempting to recreate their first-inning exploits while also improving their second-inning performance.

Ireland will head into this Test against England with a lot of confidence after their previous Lord’s encounter. On the first day of the 2019 Test, they bowled England out for 85 in the first innings, thanks to Tim Murtagh’s brilliant 5/13 from just nine overs.

“That might sound a bit loose and a bit hard, but the way they play it’s going to be probably a million miles an hour, something that we haven’t come up against. We’re very young in our Test career and we’ve just come back from three Tests in the subcontinent [against Sri Lanka and Bangladesh], which was challenging in it’s own right,” the Ireland skipper said.

“Coming to Lord’s, on the eve of The Ashes, with an England team that are playing an amazing brand of Test cricket – it’s going to be incredibly challenging. But the beauty of it is it’s a one off Test, so we can just go ahead and express ourselves and hopefully entertain people,” he added.

Teams:

England XI: Ben Duckett, Zak Crawley, Ollie Pope, Joe Root, Harry Brook, Ben Stokes (c), Jonny Bairstow, Stuart Broad, Matthew Potts, Josh Tongue (debut) and Jack Leach.

Ireland squad: Andrew Balbirnie (c), Mark Adair, Curtis Campher, George Dockrell, Matthew Foster, Fionn Hand, Graham Hume, Tom Mayes, Andrew McBrine, James McCollum, PJ Moor, Paul Stirling, Harry Tector, Lorcan Tucker and Craig Young.